Irving v. Lipstadt

Transcripts

I think I said that myself and I do rather 1a litigant in person and you are, if I may say so, 2handling your task extremely well, but one of the things 3that you do learn is to take hints if you are doing it 4professionally . I understand how difficult it is for you 5because there is stuff in those first 150 pages which you 6understandably take fierce objection to. 7MR IRVING: It sets my teeth on edge, a lot of it. 8MR JUSTICE GRAY: It is not going to bulk very large in my 9thinking. 10MR IRVING: Your Lordship knows how your Lordship is thinking 11but, with respect, I do not. You have a poker face and a 12complete mask like demeanour which keeps me totally in the 13dark. People ask me when I go home how have you done and 14I say I not know. 15MR JUSTICE GRAY: That is probably best. Anyway, I have given 16the hint yet again. Mr Rampton is going shortly to ask me 17to make a ruling about it and, if I have to make a ruling, 18you know the way I am thinking at the moment, so let us 19get on. 20MR IRVING: Can we leap forward to page 47 of your report, 21please? Harsh words on John Charmley now, a right wing 22historian at the University of East Anglia. 23A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
What is harsh about that? He is right-wing. I do not 24think he makes any secret of that. He is a former 25colleague of mine. 26Q.
[Mr Irving]
Does that disqualify somebody if they are right-wing?

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1A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
No, certainly not. 2MR JUSTICE GRAY: That is enough about Mr Charmley. On to your 3next point. I am not being flippant at all, but there is 4nothing there for you, Mr Irving, I do not think, so come 5on. 6MR IRVING: Can I ask your Lordship to go to page 26 of the 7little bundle, please? Recently received, but if your 8Lordship feels it is irrelevant, then I shall move on. 9MR JUSTICE GRAY: He pays you a warm tribute and wishes you 10well in your libel action. 11MR IRVING: Can I take you to page 49, please? 12A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
I am just saying that I quote Professor Charmley and 13saying that he admires Mr Irving in my report. 14MR IRVING: My Lord, if I am referred to as some kind of pariah 15in the academic community whose views are worth nothing, 16I find myself ---- 17MR JUSTICE GRAY: That is not the way I approach it. I am 18trying to find a way round this problem because I can see 19you are not going to take my hint. I have seen plenty of 20evidence, you have shown me a lot of evidence, from very 21distinguished people like Lord Trevor-Roper paying you 22tributes and, as a military historian, I certainly accept 23the evidence that I have heard about the number of people 24who have a very high regard for you. But in the end it is 25not as a military historian that you are appearing really 26in this trial. You are appearing for the very specific

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1detailed criticisms of your approach made by Professor 2Evans, and those are what matter. 3MR IRVING: You are talking about assassinations, is this right 4Professor? 5A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
Sorry, where is this. 6Q.
[Mr Irving]
On page 49, and the suggestion which is implicit in that 7paragraph that the British did not carry out 8assassinations, that I should not have hinted that we did, 9and Irving's claim that the democracies had no hesitation 10about killing their foreign opponents. Do you accept that 11the British did carry out assassinations in World War II? 12A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
I am describing Trevor-Roper's view of your work, and I am 13recounting what he says in a section that is about your 14reputation as an historian, where I try and lay out what 15your reputation amongst professional historians has been 16and is. I am not responsible for justifying every last 17detail of what every historian I quote has written about 18your work. 19Q.
[Mr Irving]
Do you reference the assassination of Chancellor Dollfuss 20in 1934? 21MR JUSTICE GRAY: I am sorry, I am not going to go into the 22assassination of the Austrian Chancellor in 1934. It has 23nothing to do with this case at all. You have to move on, 24Mr Irving. I really am not going to let this case grind 25almost to a halt on peripheral material. 26MR IRVING: I am moving on. A 700 page report has been dumped

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1on me by this expert witness in which he has used this 2material to blacken my name and set my teeth on edge. It 3has been very widely quoted and I do not know what your 4Lordship is attending to or not. 5MR JUSTICE GRAY: I am not attending to other historians' views 6about the issues I have to decide. In the end they are 7for me to decide, apart from those who have provided 8reports. 9MR IRVING: Move to page 57, please. I have leapt 20 questions 10there, my Lord. 11MR JUSTICE GRAY: I do realize you have. I recognize that. 12MR IRVING: 2.5.29, please. The allegation that I invented 13sources by Mr Charles Sydnor. 14A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
Once again, this is still in a section that is discussing 15your reputation amongst other historians. 16Q.
[Mr Irving]
So you feel quite comfortable in throwing these kinds of 17reports or allegations or opinions of other historians at 18me to criticise my reputation without investigating how 19true they were? 20A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
It is not a central part of my report, Mr Irving. I am 21simply trying to establish that some historians have been 22extremely critical of your methods. That includes 23particularly Sydnor and Brozsat. I am aware of the fact 24that you replied to Sydnor and I dealt with that in my 25response to the written questions which you submitted. 26MR JUSTICE GRAY: Do you adopt Sydnor's criticism? This is

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1Mr Irving's problem and I am not unsympathetic towards 2it. You recite the criticisms that Sydnor makes and then 3you in some way seem to rather disavow them when you come 4to give evidence. Are you saying that what Sydnor said is 5a justified criticism? Or are you simply giving it as 6background, as it were, to your own criticisms? That is 7his problem as you, I am sure, understand. 8A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
I can see the problem. 9Q.
[Mr Justice Gray]
If you say well, no, I am not making that any part of my 10case, then it may be that Mr Irving will feel we can 11forget about Mr Sydnor. 12MR IRVING: Yes. We could do that with a whole number of my 13critics. 14A.
[Professor Richard John Evans]
What I am saying, trying to be as precise about it as 15possible, is that it seems to me that Sydnor is an 16authoritative critic, but of course I cannot say that 17every one of his criticisms is justified. It is not in 18the end part of my case at all. I am not taking up these 19points and making them in my own treatment of your work. 20I make a whole set of separate points about your work. 21This is to do with your reputation amongst historians. 22MR IRVING: Can I draw your attention to the middle sentence 23where you say: "In his efforts to present Hitler in a 24humane light", which is one of the allegations against me, 25"Irving, wrote Sydnor, manipulated sources, invented 26incidents" -- that is a pretty serious allegation --